South Africa’s Ruling Party to Open Membership to Blacks

President Frederick W. de Klerk announced Friday that the ruling National Party will open its membership to all races and search for new political allies in advance of negotiations with black leaders to end 42 years of minority white rule.

De Klerk’s announcement to mix party ranks for the first time since it was formed in 1914 was immediately endorsed by the first of four provincial party congresses that must formally approve policy measures before they are implemented. The measure could be in force by the end of the year.

“The National Party will work for alliances or a broad political movement which unites those who think alike in respective common goals on the basis of shared convictions on important points of departure and values,” De Klerk told the Natal province congress in the Indian Ocean port city of Durban.

“The existing restrictions on membership in the NP are in conflict with the party’s declared point of view against racial discrimination and constitute an obstacle to forming alliances,” he said.

The move is scheduled to take effect after the four provincial congresses have met and could occur before year’s end after amendments to the statutes of each provincial party.

De Klerk’s decisions to open party ranks and seek new political allies on a nonracial basis reflect growing concern within the government over its leverage in looming power-sharing negotiations with black leaders on a post-apartheid constitution.

Senior Cabinet Minister Stoffel van der Merwe said “equal weight” was given to finding new partners for the negotiations and to any elections that might follow the drafting of a post-apartheid constitution.

None of the possible allies with the exclusively white National Party were identified, and government officials refused to go beyond the president’s statement.

However, potential partners could include supporters of both Indian and mixed race (Colored) parties that have participated in a controversial tricameral Parliament since 1984. Among potential black allies is the exclusively Zulu political movement Inkatha led by Mangosuthu Buthelezi--long regarded as a more moderate black leader than Nelson Mandela, who heads the leading black anti-apartheid alliance, the African National Congress.

De Klerk’s move drew immediate condemnation from the right-wing opposition and skepticism from the ANC. An unreserved welcome came only from the liberal parliamentary opposition.

“It’s the last straw. . . . It’s outrageous, and white voters will not stand for it,” Conservative Party chief spokesman Koos van der Merwe said. “The NP of today bears the same resemblance to the NP of 10 years ago as an ostrich to an elephant.”

ANC Information Secretary Pallo Jordan asserted, “It will not mean fundamental change because the NP has always been an Afrikaner ethnic nationalist party.” But Democratic Party co-leader Zach de Beer read the move as a sign that “racism in white politics is on the way out.”

De Klerk told delegates from about 20 regions of Natal, who greeted his announcement with sustained applause, “This is a big step, a far-reaching step, we are starting to take today, but I can assure you it is a well-considered step.”

He said the “new South Africa demands that those who belong together through inner conviction should come together.”

The National Party accepted that there would be “an inevitable realignment in the party political sphere in the new South Africa,” De Klerk said, adding that the party “believes that the basis for future cooperation should be laid now, otherwise valuable opportunities will be lost.”

He warned the party to “expect a storm from the right” and Koos Van der Merwe noted, “They can expect a lot more than just anger. . . . People are not going to tolerate this government at the ballot box any longer.”

Natal party chief George Bartlett acknowledged a possibility that “there may be some that will possibly find this hard to take,” but added that party machinery was being mobilized to act at grass-roots level.

He also said of the change: “It’s a major step forward in the National Party’s evolution and development. I believe that what happened here was inevitable. It opens up a whole new era, not only for the National Party but for politics in general.

“For us in the National Party, it was a great moment and a great day.”

Stoffel van der Merwe, apparently seeking to downplay white fears of being swamped, conceded it was “technically” possible that a black person could one day head the National Party. But he noted that the United States took until 1960 to elect a Roman Catholic as president and has yet to elect a black.

De Klerk launched his program of racial reform in February, legalizing the ANC and other black opposition parties, releasing Nelson Mandela, promising to scrap discriminatory laws introduced in the years since the National Party came to power, and moving toward power-sharing with the black majority.

“Power-sharing of necessity implies joint decision-making on matters of common interest in joint constitutional structures,” De Klerk told the congress.

“Among all population groups, there is a growing realization that this policy (of power-sharing) offers the only workable framework for a stable new South Africa,” he said.

“I am more than ever convinced we will succeed in negotiating a fair, just and decent constitution,” he told delegates. “The people of South Africa must find a way to live together in peace because we cannot run away from each other.”